Traffic flow and deep packet inspection technology has been deployed in networks for implementing traffic and policy management (TPM). Such technology may be used for controlling congestion. For example, in a mobile network, edge congestion may be controlled by deploying TPM systems at the Gi interface. Congestion can occur, for example, at radio access network (RAN) edge equipment such as a NodeB and a radio network controller (RNC). Further, congestion may occur on specific RAN segments, and not others, i.e., on certain NodeB elements but not necessarily all, or certain RNC elements but not necessarily all. Congestion may also manifest itself via link congestion on Iub interfaces, Iu interfaces, or Gn interfaces throughout the network, causing signaling and traffic latency or even loss. Further, congestion may manifest itself via computational overload of the network elements themselves, such as a serving GPRS support node (SGSN), an RNC, and/or a NodeB, due to the aggregate bitrate of congested traffic levels and/or the increased frequency of signaling messages.
Congestion may be due to the dynamics of an access network hierarchy, where individual cell sites, and other RAN equipment can become overloaded either in bandwidth utilization, or in signaling computational load due to the geographical deployment, number of users, and type of traffic traversing the system. It is noted that this problem exists for many network types, and is not limited solely to the aforementioned example. For example, cable networks can have access level congestion at a data over cable service interface specification (DOCSIS)/cable modem termination system (CMTS) and MTA access layer, prior to extraction of pure IP and aggregation to internet core infrastructure. In another example, mobile networks, such as 3G and 4G, can have access level congestion at the RAN. In yet another example, xDSL networks can have access level congestion affecting the digital subscriber line access multiplexer (DSLAM) network access provider (NAP) prior to aggregation at the NSP termination to internet core infrastructure. Congestion difficulties may also arise in other wireless network architectures such as the 4G LTE network architecture where GGSN, SGSN, RNC and NodeB become upgraded to P-GW, S-GW, and e-NodeB running upgraded management protocols.
The emergence of congestion is a dynamic (real-time) event that causes significant cost impacts to a network operator on infrastructure equipment, network management costs, and loss of subscribers due to dissatisfaction regarding network performance. In particular, the emergence of advanced IP based endpoints or user equipment (UE) such as smartphones, smart-TVs, tablet computing devices, and laptops continuously increases the signaling and traffic load on the network, creating an ever increasing congestion problem for the network operator. Existing solutions require gross macro level traffic throttling and costly infrastructure scale improvements to manage the increased traffic. As the traffic congestion may dynamically appear on any network segment, often network-wide infrastructure costs are impacted. Access level congestion can make it difficult for an operator to ensure the quality of experience (QoE) of the end user, ensure fair traffic handling across all users of the network, and cost effectively manage network infrastructure.
Accordingly, in view of the foregoing, it is desired to provide improved techniques for network traffic and signaling management.